Membakut : In conjunction with the on-going Election Commission (EC) re-delineation exercise of state constituency in Sabah, UPKO Kimanis Division chief Mr. Tailin Mainan suggest that Barisan Nasional especially UMNO should give chance to its Kadazandusun Murut based party counterpart to represent their own community in all constituency. This is inline with the principal of power sharing concept which upheld by all of Barisan Nasional component party. He was speaking during Kimanis UPKO divisional meeting recently in Membakut.

Mr. Tailin reiterate that some UMNO members should stop making claims for KDM seats especially through the mass media.

“What is happening in Kota Marudu and Keningau is disheartening. Making claims on KDM majority seats and asking a Barisan Nasional component deputy president to give up his seat is ridiculous. Who give them authority to dictate other component party? ”

He urges all UPKO members to stay calm and don’t react to such baseless claims made by some UMNO members.

“After all UMNO have dominated more than 55% of seats in Sabah apart from contesting all bumiputera seats in West Malaysia. UPKO never argue this.” Tailin also noted that former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had declared UPKO as the only party that represented the KDM race during the UPKO Congress in 2003.

He believe that under the new leadership of Prime Minister Datuk Sri Najib who is also the Barisan Nasional Chairman, will be fair and understand the needs of minority component party in Barisan Nasional.

Tailin, who is also UPKO supreme council member, reminded that UPKO, all these while, fighting for the KDM cause in education, language, citizenship and other matters.

“KDM community numbers are less than one million in whole entire world. We cannot determine the rules of the game because we are too few and mostly will be dictate by Malay majority “We just want to make sure that the minority are well represented and respected in the country” he stressed.

Also present during the meeting were Kimanis UPKO Deputy Chief, Gundohing Godfrey Daya, all division members as well as Kimanis UPKO wing leaders Wilfred Stephen and Cecilia Ondoi.

This was one of the areas the country could look at seriously, to reduce the number of immigrant workers in the country while prioritising jobs for locals, said Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Dompok.

He noted the dependency on foreign labour was “very great”, to such an extent the government applied strong measures to ensure locals were employed in the country’s main industries.

“To get Malaysians to work, what is required are people with training, knowledge upgrade…in the case of Sabah, we have the Monfort Youth Training Centre, so what I want to do is try to see if their programmes can be tailored for the plantation industry, so there will be a ready source of employees when they graduate.

“I think this applies to the many training establishments that we have in the country,” he said after launching the ‘Career in Plantation Industries and Commodities Sector Talk and Exhibition here Sunday.

He said for a country employing so many immigrant labourers, it was therefore, not right to see its own people not being able to secure jobs.

The nation’s plantation industry, he said, was currently employing nearly half a million foreign workers, mainly from neighbouring countries, and more than 50 per cent are those in Sabah.

As at January this year, there are 1.9 million registered foreign workers in the country, a drop of 200,000 from 2.1 million registered foreign workers as at September last year, according to Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin in May.

Asked for reasons why locals were not entering the plantation sector, Dompok said it was based on a mixture of factors, adding that he was currently in talks with plantation owners to overcome this issue.

“Maybe, one way is to upgrade the facilities in the plantation, for example living acommodation or quarters,” he said.

Kota Kinabalu: Upko’s Citizenship and Security Bureau has handed over 36 longstanding citizenship applications to the National Registration Department (NRD) in Sabah for a speedy solution.

The cases were handed over by the Bureau chief, Donald Mojuntin, during a courtesy call on the NRD Sabah Director, Haji Abdul Jaffear Henry, at the Federal Administrative Complex here.

Apart from discussing matters directly pertaining to citizenship, other related issues were raised like the issue of the Sabah Native Certificate and “Surat Berian” Wedding Status which falls under the State Native Court.

The use of the terms “Native” and “Sino-Native” in national identification documents were also queried as Upko is of the opinion that “Native” is not a specific race but just a categorical or a generic term used to describe a group of indigenous people.

“Furthermore the usage of the term is not legally accepted by the State of Sabah as it has not gone through the necessary stages to make it so. The matter should first be vetted by the State Attorney General’s office.

“When that is done, it will then have to be endorsed by the State Cabinet.

Finally it will have to pass through the State Assembly. Then and only then can it be accepted as a legal term that can be used in documents as important as our personal identifications. Otherwise it will and does create, for instance, NT land inheritance problems,” he said.

Mojuntin who is also Assistant Finance Minister and Moyog State Assemblyman and his delegation was also briefed by Jaffear on the department’s vision, mission, operation, past and up-coming programmes.

Mojuntin said the purpose of the visit was to deliberate on certain issues related to citizenship and also to enhance ties with NRD.

“As one of the main objectives of the Bureau is to ensure only genuine Sabahans or those legally qualified for it are bestowed citizenship, it is only appropriate to build and foster a strong and practical working relationship with the NRD,” he said.

He added that the visit was also auspicious as it comes right after the Prime Minister’s announcement of his 11 people-friendly measures which include improvements to the process of registering births in Sabah and Sarawak, on the occasion of his 100th day in office.

According to Mojuntin, the bureau had been receiving numerous grievances and complaints related to citizenship.

“These problems stem from non and late registrations of births, being born outside Sabah before Malaysia Day, marriages with foreigners and a myriad of other situations.

“This issue of citizenship, especially in Sabah, is one of the few fundamental problems that need to be sorted out for the Prime Minister’s 1Malaysia concept to be achieved, he said.

“We must remember that most of these relevant applicants have family members who are citizens. If their respective problem is not dealt with efficiently, it will not only disillusion the applicants themselves but their family members and friends will also lose confidence in the government’s delivery system and perhaps, the integrity of the government. It would be like a negative pyramid effect.”

Jaffear commended the effort of the Upko Bureau and welcomed any helping hand to assist the NRD, especially from elected representatives whether State or Parliament.

“The NRD is open to all constructive suggestions from any party as this will improve our department’s efficiency,” he said.